The Adventures of Ford Fairlane

Directed by Renny Harlin, The Adventures of Ford Fairlane follows rock ‘n roll detective Ford Fairlane (Andrew Dice Clay) as he’s drawn into a case involving a missing groupie and a series of unsolved murders. There’s little doubt that The Adventures of Ford Fairlane fares best in its briskly-paced and appreciatively irreverent opening stretch, as Harlin, working from a script by Daniel Waters, James Capp, and David Arnott, does an effective job of initially establishing the oddball title character and the seamy, seedy world in which he exists – with the novelty of Clay, virtually playing himself, stepping into the shoes of a veritable superhero certainly adding a fair degree of irresistible novelty to the proceedings. It’s only as the picture moves into its repetitive and progressively uninvolving midsection that one’s interest begins to flag, as the central mystery, which grows more and more complicated, simply isn’t interesting in the slightest and, in a far more problematic development, it does become increasingly tough to take Dice’s grating, one-note performance (ie there are no notes to Ford Fairlane aside from macho bravado, essentially). The somewhat endless climax ensures that the whole thing concludes with a fairly palpable whimper, and although there are a few minor pleasures sprinkled throughout the film (eg Ed O’Neill’s tiny role as a disco-singer-turned-detective remains an ongoing highlight), The Adventures of Ford Fairlane primarily comes off as a misguided star vehicle that’s aged horribly in the years since its 1990 release.

** out of ****